


Bony Legs and Furry Bodies

by Allecto



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-26
Updated: 2014-02-26
Packaged: 2018-01-13 20:56:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1240525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allecto/pseuds/Allecto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was all Uncle Peter's fault. It <i>was</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bony Legs and Furry Bodies

**Author's Note:**

> For Tropes Bingo, Round 3: Character in Distress
> 
> Thanks go to Eleanor_Lavish and SchuylerDade for beta, you guys are amazing *mwah*

Everyone knew that playing in the woods alone was dangerous, even for little Hales. Especially for little Hales, according to Uncle Peter, who liked to put Cora to bed with stories of hunters and woodsmen and Winchesters.

Uncle Peter didn’t get to put her to bed very often.

The woods were dangerous, and it was dark, and Cora hadn’t _meant_ to go alone, she _hadn’t_. But Derek took the big kids’ bus home now, and Laura drove a car instead of taking the bus at all, so there was no one to help when Cora was late.

Mrs. Stilinski usually noticed if someone was left behind, but Mrs. Stilinski was out sick and the substitute teacher, Ms. Johnson, must’ve just thought Cora got on the bus like all the other bus kids, because by the time Cora realized the bus was gone, and made her way back to the classroom where the pick-up kids were met by their parents, no one was there.

So she’d pulled her backpack on again, zipped up her coat, and started walking.

She had a good nose, it wasn’t a _problem_. She wouldn’t get _lost_.

Only then she did. 

It was Uncle Peter’s fault, it _was_ , because he’d been in charge of bedtime last night, and he’d told her how Baba Yaga lived in a chicken-foot house that wandered the countryside looking for unruly children to capture, so Baba Yaga could cook them and eat them for dinner, or sometimes put a collar on and keep them as pet dogs if they were extra good and brushed their teeth without reminding and didn’t ask for glasses of water after storytime ended.

Cora hadn’t asked, but then on the walk home she saw movement out of the corner of her eye, and something _cackled_ , she was _sure_ of it, and she’d started running before she could stop and think about how Mommy always said Uncle Peter was fond of teasing, or how Derek called him a jerkface and Laura rolled her eyes and ignored him, and the thing was chasing her, she knew it was, herding her through the forest and she couldn’t let it get to Derek or Laura or Mommy so she veered off the road and fell down a ditch and hurt her ankle and got up and ran on and on and on and then there was a hole or something, and she fell in and water came up to her chin so she couldn’t sit down and her ankle had healed but her backpack was soaked and her picture she’d drawn of her family was probably _ruined_ , and she wasn’t going to cry because she was a big girl, she _was_.

Her head hurt, though, and no one was ever going to find her and it was getting darker and darker and she thought she heard something crashing through the trees and it was probably Baba Yaga and she threw back her head and howled, because she didn’t know what else to do.

And then Uncle Peter was there, and she _hated_ him, she _did_.

“What do we have here?” he asked, and Cora glared at him and wiped her nose with the back of her sleeve.

Uncle Peter winced.

“That’s not going to endear you to your mother, you know.”

“It’s not my fault,” Cora said, “I didn’t ask for a glass of water! You know I didn’t, please don’t let her eat me! I don’t want a chicken house, Uncle Peter, I want _our_ house!”

Uncle Peter rolled his eyes. “Baba Yaga isn’t real, you impetuous brat. Now hold still while I find a rope. If you’re very good, I may even tell you the story of the Wolf Girl of Devil’s River, who was captured for six whole years before escaping to find her pack had been slaughtered.”

Uncle Peter’s teeth were very big, and very white, and Cora hated the way the light flashed off them when he smiled. But Derek was running up beside him, and Derek wouldn’t let her get slaughtered or eaten or collared by chicken feet. Derek wouldn’t let anything happen to her _ever_ , because that’s what big brothers were _for_ , and Derek sat with her while Uncle Peter looked for rope, and dangled his feet down the edge of the hole, and told her about the time they went out for the full moon, before Cora was even born and Derek was only five, and he lost Mommy’s scent and spent two hours wandering in a circle before she caught up to him. 

“She picked me up by the back of the neck and carried me home like that,” Derek said. “The toothmarks didn’t fade until morning, but you know what?”

“W-what?”

“When I came downstairs she’d made pancakes shaped like hearts, and that day after school we went out together and practiced following scent trails and Mom made sure I’d never get lost again.”

“D’you think we can have pancakes tomorrow?” Cora asked.

Derek nodded, and then Uncle Peter was back with Laura and Mommy and Mommy said, “oh, sweetheart,” and Cora knew everything would be okay.

And after Mommy and Laura and Derek had hugged her, Uncle Peter dropped a hand to her shoulder and squeezed, just a little too hard so she’d feel it, and told her she was much too small to interest Baba Yaga anyway.

Derek gave her a piggyback ride, and Mommy promised to air dry her picture, and Laura tugged her braid and called her moppet, and in the morning there were pancakes.


End file.
